Sharon Bowles' Report to Conference

3.10.00pm GMT Fri 16th Feb 2007

"In 2006, MEPs voted some 5,500 times! Over the last few months these votes have included the final stages of some substantial pieces of legislation. They include the Services Directive which seeks to eliminate the obstacles to a proper free movement of services between the Member States and REACH, for which Chris Davies led the negotiations for the ALDE group. The largest-ever item of EU legislation, replacing some 40 existing texts, REACH is intended to ensure that the 30,000 chemicals in daily use present no long term threats to human health or the environment.

Chris Davies has also worked on the Framework Directive on Waste Policy, intended to place a legal obligation on member states to curb the growth in waste where his amendments at first reading were supported by the Parliament. An ALDE seminar he organised on curbing the importation into the EU of wild birds has since been followed by the announcement by the Commission of a permanent ban. Currently, Liberal Democrats are taking a lead in trying to toughen proposed legislation to curb CO2 emissions from new motor vehicles.

Diana Wallis has become the first Liberal Democrat and British female vice president of the European Parliament. She is ALDE's Spokesperson on the Legal Affairs Committee and has been continuing her work on improving access to justice and facilitating the process of making cross border claims in relation to civil torts such as road traffic accidents (the so-called "Rome II" report). Diana is a substitute member on the Internal Market Committee and is joint rapporteur on the European Contract Law project. This remains potentially the biggest project facing the EU legislator in the field of civil and commercial law. She is also the rapporteur on the committee of inquiry into the insurance company Equitable Life, which is set to report in mid-2007.

Andrew Duff has published his Plan B for the EU constitution (www.notre-europe.eu) to a warm reception. He continues to work for an early renegotiation of the 2004 constitutional treaty with a view to its acceptance by 2009. He has also been prominent in forming the Parliament's view of the 'absorption capacity' of the Union and in sticking up for Turkey (and North Cyprus) during these difficult months for the Turkish EU accession process. Andrew is much involved in the debate on the setting up of a European Institute for Technology, a decent home for which could be found, he believes, in the East of England - although each of us have our own ideas as to where would make a decent home!

Saj Karim was rapporteur on EU-India Trade and Economic Relations. The report was adopted by an overwhelming majority of the house in September and formed the basis of negotiations at the 7th EU-India Summit in Helsinki in October. Saj is the draftsperson for the European Parliament WTO Steering Group to the Inter-Parliamentary Union. In response to the Commission's Communication: "Global Europe: Competing in the World," Saj presented a paper on "Multilateralism and Bilateralism" at the WTO IPU's Annual Conference in December. Saj successfully concluded his six month cross-party campaign, involving MPs, MEPs, Peers, EU External Relations Commissioner, Benita Ferrero Waldner, and Prince Charles, for the release of Mirza Tahir Hussain, a British national from Leeds, who had spent 18 years on death row in Pakistan.

Emma Nicholson has continued her work on the Foreign Affairs Committee. From August to December Emma served as Chief Observer of the EU's Election Observation Mission to the Presidential Elections in Yemen. The elections were judged to be democratic and were well received by the international community. Having been the Parliament's rapporteur for Romania between 1999-2004 and the ALDE's shadow rapporteur since 2004, Emma witnessed many years of hard work come to fruition on 1 January 2007 when Romania finally became an EU member state. In her current capacity as the Parliament's rapporteur on Kashmir, Emma submitted her draft report to the Foreign Affairs Committee in November following her two fact-finding visits to Pakistan and India in June 2006. The draft report is currently undergoing the parliamentary process and Emma continues to consult with an extensive range of parliamentary colleagues and interested parties outside the Parliament on all the issues concerned.

Bill Newton Dunn is rapporteur on 'the Fight Against Organised Crime' in the parliament's Justice & Home Affairs committee. The problem is that international gangs, based mainly outside the EU, cross Europe's open internal borders with impunity, trafficking drugs, immigrants, prostitutes, children,fake goods and tobacco, VAT carousel fraud, phishing, etc. But Europe's police forces are all national and cannot cross borders in pursuit nor fight them effectively. The Home Office says that each kilo of imported heroin leads to over 200 crimes in our streets. Bill concludes therefore, as Britain's most pro-European party, that Liberal Democrats could reduce crime in Britain dramatically by creating a European FBI. His website www.organisedcrime.info tells all. His other website shows people how to check what data is held about them by government and big business at www.protectyourpersonaldata.eu

Sharon Bowles was appointed the rapporteur for the Parliament's report on fiscal fraud and is pushing for reform to curb the estimated £8bn billion lost through carousel fraud in the UK (the equivalent to 4p on income tax) and 250bn lost through other frauds across the EU. As shadow rapporteur on payments Sharon continues to negotiate with the Commission and the Council Presidency to reach an urgent single reading agreement. She is also shadow rapporteur on Solvency II, dubbed one of the most significant pieces of financial legislation of this mandate, for which work has already begun to modernise EU legislation on life and non-life insurance, winding-up and reinsurance. It will revise 14 existing directives. Sharon also played a vital role in the Television Without Frontiers directive getting through her amendment on advertising times by a single vote to ensure British producers are able to raise funds for good quality productions.

Liz Lynne was recently the Parliament's draftsperson for the EU's Disability Action Plan 2007--2008 and has continued to campaign on issues such as human rights, Guantánamo, Kashmir, trafficking in human beings and antidiscrimination policy, as well as health issues including Cancer and Asthma. Liz, as the employment spokesperson, led the ALDE party's response to the revision of the EU's Working Time Directive, in addition to leading for the Lib Dem's in the Employment Committee for reports on Professional Football, the Services Directive and the Posting of Workers Directive.

Graham Watson was re-elected to lead the EP's Liberal group (Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe) which now has 106 MEPs. He is the first leader ever to be elected to a third term of office. He has recently published two new books: 'Liberty in Art' (Mondadori, Ed) and 'The Power of Speech' (Bagehot Publishing).

Fiona Hall produced a report in the Industry Committee on radio spectrum policy, calling for a freeing up of frequencies across Europe, on the Ofcom model. In the European Energy Package she has pushed for full liberalisation and unbundling, clear and binding targets on renewables and energy efficiency and climate change targets compatible with achieving a 2°C limit on global warming. In the autumn she met with local people severely affected by climate change in the arid North West of Kenya, worked on wider environment/security issues such as illegal logging and observed the successful second round of the elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

In her role of vice-chair of the temporary committee on alleged CIA 'extraordinary rendition' activities in Europe, whose report is due to be adopted in February, Sarah Ludford led a delegation to London where MEPs met alleged victims, lawyers, MPs, and Europe Minister Geoff Hoon. She is steering to a conclusion in the Civil Liberties Committee a key piece of legislation concerning EU border security, the Visa Information System which is a huge database of visa applicants including fingerprints, and has successfully fought for strong data protection safeguards. Sarah has regularly demonstrated in Parliament Square with campaigning comedian Mark Thomas against Labour's restrictions on the right to protest.

As Fisheries Co-ordinator, Elspeth Attwooll's recent work in the Fisheries Committee has included holding an ALDE hearing on Fisheries Partnership Agreements with countries outside the EU, which will lead to a new Group policy in this area. Elspeth is also Parliament's Rapporteur on the enhancement of the role of Regional Advisory Councils. As Vice Chair of the Regional Development Committee, she is involved in continuing structural funds discussions at local level, and is leading the Group's opinion on developing a European strategy for islands in the context of regional policy.

There are also a number of important issues on the horizon. Earlier this year the European Commission adopted a package of non-legislative measures to establish a new Energy Policy for Europe. The package focuses on combating climate change and boosting the EU's energy security and competitiveness. There is an overall target to cut greenhouse gas emissions by at least 20% by 2020 with three areas to achieve this: creating a true internal energy market; speeding up the shift to a low carbon economy with a target of 20% of the EU's energy to come from renewables; and energy efficiency with a target of saving 20% of total primary energy consumption by 2020. The proposals stated that the actions will need to be underpinned by a coherent and credible external policy and that the EU needs to work with both developed and developing countries. As true Lib Dems we will be following this very closely.

Other issues for the next six months will include the revival of the constitution, a strong united EU position on the future of Kosovo, the troubled relations between the EU and NATO, as well as Parliamentary efforts to take a coherent view on the reform of the financial system."

Sharon Bowles MEP

Chief Whip (European Parliament)

January 2007